“Food is really how both my obsessions for wine and travel began. It’s something that is accessible from everyone’s home but it’s a door into different flavours and cultures. As I found myself exploring recipe books from a young age I started looking up the countries where each dish came from and began raiding my parent’s wine collection to understand what the recipe book writer meant by ‘a perfect pairing’. Food for me is one of the purest and most generous pleasures that unites people from all over. Dig in!”
For some food wine pairings visit my wine tasting blog, The Squeeze.
Pairing Empanadas with South American wines
If there’s one dish that you’ll find in every country in South America, it’s the mighty empanada. It may be fluffy and moist, or crisp and crunchy, bite sized or head sized, baked or fried… whatever texture and filling variation comes your way, these pockets of pastry are a perfect, unpretentious appetizer that pair wonderfully with the region’s wines…
Grape Collective, January 2015
Lunching in Mendoza’s wine country
Ever since moving to the sunny and pleasant land of Mendoza, my favorite pastime has been eating in wineries. Yes, the mountains are awe-inspiring, the sunny days permeate your skin to warm your soul and the people all flatter you till your knees melt; but for me, it’s all about lunch…
Great Wine Capitals, May 2014
A Map of Chile’s Food and Wine
“There aren’t many places that can boast the prodigious geographical diversity of Chile: deep forests buffeted by creeping glaciers; sun cracked deserts and white washed salt flats; snowcapped mountains, smoking volcanoes and the dizzying heights of the Andes; fertile valleys with rolling hillsides; and an enviable expanse of Pacific coast spanning 29° of latitude. The heart of Chilean wine and gastronomy reflects this topographical potpourri and any glimpse into Chilean cuisine reveals an encyclopedia of endemic ingredients…”
International Wine & Food Society, April 2013
“The empanada. An essential for any peckish backpacker, lazy party food contributor and Argentine restaurant menu. A simple, stuffed savory pastry that looks innocent enough but carries within its golden pouch one of the longest and richest culinary histories…”
Playground Buenos Aires, April 2014: Page 8
“Eating out… in (that is eating out at a ‘home’ restaurant) is being heralded as a new and trendy concept across cosmopolitan cities around the world. However paying to eat at other people’s houses is how the ‘restaurant’ originally started. It was Ma Yung’s chicken house in China that…”
Wine Republic, April 2011: page 24
Wine Republic Awards 2010: ‘The List’
Mendoza’s best restaurants reviewed by Amanda Barnes in Wine Republic’s Awards 2010: The List.
Wine Republic, 1 July 2010
A perfect marraige: Italian food in Mendoza
“And how does Maria Teresa make her renowned pasta you ask? “You take the flour, eggs and a pinch of salt, and kneed it as if you are conducting music,” she moved her hands in a sweeping orchestra conductor motion, “then you leave it to rest. I always think of making pasta…”
The Mendoza Sun, 6 June 2010
Azafran: Nouvelle Cuisine a la Mendoza
“Azafran is an inspiring, beautiful restaurant that proves perfectly how Argentine cuisine is no longer grid locked at steak and empanadas but is working its way into the world of ‘nueva cocina Argentina’ and finesse. Starting life out as a deli specialising in imported goods in…”
The Mendoza Sun, 24 April 2010
